A journey to find purpose and to create a meaningful life

From Wild Adventures to Eating Pierogies in Bed

First, I was in Dubai for a week. Then, just one night at home, and I was off to Boston for another week. Now, I have been back in New York for just three days.

In Dubai, I had been given the opportunity to lead a training with two other professionals for 3 days. I was terribly excited. I gave 110% percent, making sure that I was giving my all to the project and still keeping up with my typical work responsibilities. Finding some time to explore my surroundings, while balancing all the work. And luckily, everything ended up turning out well.

Then, last week, I was in Boston for a course at Harvard on “Rethinking Financial Inclusion.” For a week, I was surrounded by 50 smart, driven, passionate professionals from all over the world, discussing what was working in financial inclusion and trying to develop new solutions to problems each of us were seeing in the world. Individuals from Lebanon, Nigeria, India, Indonesia, and many other countries (only 3 from the US!). It was an incredible experience, and I believe that some of the connections I made will be some that I will keep for a lifetime.

And now, after everything these past two weeks, I am back to New York. I wake up, go running, go into work, do my work, make smalltalk in the kitchen with coworkers, take a walk during lunch around midtown, come home, make some food, and go to bed.

I still find myself sitting in bed, eating pierogies and peas in my pjs, thinking about life. This is much more my normal than riding on a boat in Dubai or having dinner in Boston with 5 people each from a different countries.

I smile, and giggle a little, thinking about how wild it is to go from having these unique, life-transforming adventures to then comeback to do the things you were doing before. Basically, going from zero to 60 and then back to zero again. Of course, it is only through this huge honor and privilege, which I have been given, that I am able to do all of these things, and I am very grateful for that.

I still bring peanut butter and jelly sandwiches to work. I still go to sleep at 9:30pm on occasion. I still call my sister to get her advice on making decisions. Somethings will never change.

I think it’s good to stay grounded and humble, even when you might feel you are flying high into a world of adventure.